Page 56 of The Sun & Her Burn

Only to be caught in the strong arms of Adam Meyers.

Who lifted her deftly to her feet, holding her close as he did so, though his eyes were pinned to me.

And he was glowering as fiercely as I’d ever seen him.

For one crystal-clear moment, it was clear he was on the edge of violence, and if I breathed wrong, he would launch himself at me, looking for blood.

I just couldn’t tell if he was angry because I had kissed his fake girlfriend, or if, perhaps wishful thinking, he was angry that she had kissedme.

13

ADAM

“Why is this so hard for you to admit?” my therapist, Dr. Eng, asked me. “It’s okay to like her, Adam.”

“You see, that’s not the point of this facade at all,” I said, opening and closing my hands fruitlessly as I sought to explain my frustration. “The point is not tolikeLinnea Kai. It’s to use her to erase the mark Oscar Hampton tried to taint my reputation with.”

“Let’s reframe that, shall we?” Dr. Eng said firmly. “Being gay or bisexual is not a ‘taint.’ It is, in fact, very natural and very beautiful.”

“Right,” I murmured, properly chastened. We had been working on my language around my queerness, reworking how I viewed it outside of the bigoted context of my father and upbringing, and the fear that had been sown when my uni mate, Gregory, had committed suicide after being outed as gay. “I only meant Oscar was trying to end my career with a sex scandal and force me to come out in a traumatic way.”

“Better,” she acknowledged kindly.

Dr. Eng was one of the best in the business and referred to me by Prince Arthur Whitley-Fairfax himself. We met over Zoom once a week, and I didn’t mind that the sessions were remote because Dr. Eng’s Britishness was essential in helping me understand some of my childhood hang-ups.

“Even if the point is to use this relationship to protect your reputation, is it such a bad thing if you happen to like the woman you are using to do it?” she pressed.

And it felt like that, pressure on a bruise. I wanted to wince but kept my expression smooth.

Yes, it bloody well mattered if I liked Linnea.

Because she wasn’t the kind of girl one simplyliked.

She was the kind of girl you bought flowers for because her beauty reminded you of her smile. She was the girl you went home after your first kiss believing she would be your last.

She was sunlight and laughter and the first smooth dive into cool, clean lake water.

And she was being wasted on a man like me.

Three years of her life shackled to this false love.

Only, she didn’t treat it like a prison sentence or what it was—martyrdom in order to give her mother a better end-of-life experience, even when Miranda had been a shite parent all her life. She approached each day with me like an adventure, bouncing over to me with a smile and leaning in close to whisper, “Come on, Adam, aren’t youcurious? Let’s go.”

And every time she uttered that word—curious—I found myself gritting my teeth against the flare of arousal in my gut.

She was so different from Savannah and the hurts I associated with her that it was hard to remember I had sworn off serious relationships withanyone.

Even beautiful girls with violet eyes and blindingly bright dispositions.

“Adam,” Dr. Eng called, pulling my focus back to her. “It’s okay to find some happiness in this shite storm. It’s okay to feel happiness at any time in any given situation. As a matter of fact, I thought we spoke about you making happiness a mindful practice.”

I fought the urge to roll my eyes and succeeded because I had been in therapy for enough years to realize that self-care wasn’t erroneous, even if I’d been raised to think it was self-indulgent laziness.

“Working on it,” I agreed.

“Our time is up, but I want you to make a promise to yourself right now. Let Linnea make you smile. It may be cliché, but the best medicine is often good company.”

I sat in my office chair after we rung off, staring at the photo I rarely took out from the locked drawer in my desk. It was a photo of Sebastian, Linnea, and me from my twenty-ninth birthday on Croyde Beach, the surprise outing Seb had organized in the wake of a godawful row with Savannah. We had taken the selfie on my phone, and it was only later—much, much later, after Sebastian had left because I’d asked him to, and Savannah had left even though I’d asked her not to—that I’d stumbled upon it. Immediately, I had thought to delete it. Phones could be hacked, and often were. There was no point in risking myself with a photo like that after conjecture about my sexuality started from a photo of Sebastian and me on that very day.